Seoul: Escaped N. Korean restaurant workers arrive in South

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) — South Korea says a group of North Koreans who escaped from a Pyongyang-run restaurant overseas where they had been working have arrived in the South.

Seoul's Unification Ministry provided no other details Wednesday.

South Korea's Yonhap news agency reported earlier in the day that three North Korean women who had been working at a restaurant in China arrived in South Korea on Tuesday afternoon or early Wednesday by flight from Thailand, where they had traveled to after escaping.

It's the second known group defection by North Korean restaurant workers dispatched abroad in recent weeks.

Pyongyang has accused Seoul of kidnapping the 13 North Koreans who worked at a North Korea-run restaurant in eastern China before escaping and defecting to South Korea last month, and has repeatedly demanded their return.